2011-09 · NASA ASRS report 968408
A320 flight crew experiences a tail strike during a night landing. Damage to the APU drain mast is noted during post flight.
With the Captain flying; [this] night landing was at 6.5 degrees of pitch. Immediately after landing; aircraft did pitch up a little; but did not seem at all unusual. There was no unusual sensation or noise during landing touchdown or rollout. However; shortly after touch-down; there was a very quick amber ECAM indication that I noticed out of my peripheral vision. During my scan; I was looking at airspeed at time of amber indication and was unable to identify since it was only illuminated about two seconds. Captain did not see the actual indication readout either; only seeing the amber light. Captain chose to look aircraft over after arriving at the gate. He stated that there had been a slight amount of damage to tail section; underneath APU; due to what he thought might have been a tail strike. Captain said he entered the occurrence in aircraft logbook.In retrospect; it appears that Captain touched down within pitch limitation; but may have pulled back on side stick at touchdown; causing a slight grazing of tail section against runway surface. This is a difficult one; because it is very difficult at times to know where the pitch is in relationship to the limitation without staring at the attitude indicator continuously. The pitch was well below the 10 degree limitation at touchdown; but evidently it changed just enough to cause a problem just after landing. I felt equally responsible for not seeing the amber indication reading; so I could report this to the Captain. I had just made the 'speed brake' callout and had shifted focus on the airspeed; anticipating the high speed turnoff ahead; when the amber light flashed on and then off. In the future; I will put more of an emphasis on monitoring pitch; not only during landing; but also just after touchdown. My scan is going to be more intense at this critical time during the flight. I also will be determined to improve my scan overall; as monitoring pilot; making sure not to fixate; but take in the entire picture before me.
During the landing; the flare may have been slightly early resulting in a slight rise after touchdown (slight bounce). While correcting for second touchdown I heard a ding (possible ECAM) with no ECAM displayed. Touchdown was smooth. During post flight inspection; discovered APU drain mast was scraped. I called Maintenance Control and made a log book entry.It is possible the ding we heard was an ECAM. [The] pitch resulted in a possible APU drain mast scrape. Winds were reported calm. However; during the approach we had a slight tail wind. In addition; the aircraft felt heavy on takeoff; climb; and approach; sluggish or slow to respond. [The aircraft was] possibly overweight. With a bounced aircraft; I normally hold attitude while [it] settles in order to prevent exceeding pitch attitude. It is a balance of attitude/airspeed to prevent floating down the runway. Airspeed bleeds off and second touch down occurs usually close to Vls. I suspect an overweight aircraft due to the close proximity of second touchdown with aircraft pitching nose up (stall) so rapidly resulting in a possible APU drain mast being dragged on the runway.One technique a First Officer showed me was to pull up the aircraft calculated weight in the FMGC (via FAC). He said he was told to accomplish this by a Check Airman as a matter of technique. The FAC uses data from elevator/thrust/airspeed and will give a weight display according to data obtained. That weight is highly accurate and often times we are about 5;000 LBS heavier than weight and balance data. As a matter of technique; if 5;000 LBS overweight add 5 KTS to the Vls as protection against a stalled landing. I have started to use his technique. However; on this flight due to the short duration I neglected to check the FAC produced weight data. I would like to see more published on this topic and training should include this cross check of available data in normal operations.
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Source: NASA Aviation Safety Reporting System (public domain). Reports are voluntary submissions and are not verified by NASA.
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